


Trust Me To Understand You

by small_town_girl



Category: Glee
Genre: Angst, Brotherhood, Communication, Family, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-05-08
Updated: 2011-05-08
Packaged: 2017-10-19 04:08:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,751
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/196700
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/small_town_girl/pseuds/small_town_girl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for the Glee Angst Meme: Kurt decides he and Finn need to talk after the wedding to better understand each other.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Trust Me To Understand You

“So,” Kurt said as he settled at one end of his couch, facing Finn. His, now official, step-brother sat at the other end and they were supposed to be talking about the wedding that had just happened but the conversation just wouldn’t start.

He’d invited Finn over to his house after the wedding while their parents went to the Hudson house for the night to celebrate their marriage. They would be leaving for their official honeymoon in a few days. He wanted to talk to Finn about what was happening, make sure the taller boy was as alright with their joined families as he said. He also wanted to make sure they talked about what happened between them in the past so it didn’t happen again. Nothing was going to ruin his dad’s relationship again.

“So,” Finn echoed. That did nothing to help start the conversation either.

“They’re really happy,” Kurt pointed out. It didn’t need to be said; they could both clearly see it.

“Yeah,” Finn sighed but it didn’t sound unhappy to Kurt. “They are.”

Finn wasn’t making this easy but Kurt knew he wasn’t doing it on purpose. Finn just wasn’t a very talkative guy, especially when it came to his feelings, and that was another reason Kurt wanted to have this conversation in private. There was a better chance of Finn talking to him if he knew nobody would walk in on them. At the wedding, with his luck, Puck would have walked in and made one of his completely unfunny jokes, causing Finn to close himself off.

“So I guess we need to talk,” Kurt knew he would have to take the first step. “I think it’s a good idea so there’s no more…misunderstandings between us.”

That reminder immediately caused a guilty look to leap on Finn’s face and Kurt felt bad. He’d forgiven him. He had no intentions of holding that fight over Finn’s head and his step-brother needed to know that.

“Finn, I’m not talking about that,” he quickly reassured the other teen. “You know you shouldn’t have said it and I know I should have said something about my crush on you and our parents should have talked to you before announcing the move. We all screwed up and we just need to make sure it doesn’t happen again, okay?”

“Okay,” Finn still sounded nervous. “What should we talk about?”

Kurt did his best not to bang his head on the coffee table. It wouldn’t be productive and it would leave a nasty bruise on his forehead.

“I think if we just ask each other some questions to better understand each other, that would be a good start,” Kurt explained. “Anything you’re wondering about me or curious about or just think you need to know, and I’ll do the same with you.”

“Without getting mad?”

“Yes,” Kurt nodded. Easier said than done he knew, but he was pretty sure he could handle it and Finn was still too scared to get angry at him. That was another thing Kurt hoped they could overcome. If they were going to live together, there would be fights over loud music and bathroom time and the television. If Finn was too scared of his dad to speak up when he was unhappy he would be miserable and that would make the rest of them miserable.

Finn frowned and for a second Kurt thought he was going to refuse. “So…like your clothes? They confuse me.”

“You’re going to have to be more specific than that,” Kurt smiled at the question. His clothes confused his father too so of course they confused Finn. Sometimes they even confused Mercedes.

“Well, like, I know you love wearing clothes that really don’t look very comfortable,” Kurt laughed at that and it seemed to settle Finn down. The other boy seemed a lot less nervous now. “But when some of the guys told you they’d leave you alone if you didn’t dress so weird, you came to school dressed in a skirt. I guess I just don’t understand why you’d still dress like that if you knew they were going to throw you in the dumpster.”

“Oh Finn Hudson, they were never going to stop even if I showed up to school in a football jersey,” Kurt shook his head in sad amusement. How could someone honestly be that naïve? “My clothes were just one excuse for them to bully me. If I changed the way I dress then they win that round and they’d move on to something else. They‘d keep wanting me to change everything about myself and they still wouldn‘t be happy.”

The look on Finn’s face told Kurt he’d never considered that possibility. That led Kurt to his own question.

“Why did you just go along with whatever those jocks wanted?” he asked. “I know you didn’t want to, you never looked like you were having fun, but you did it anyway.”

“I really am sorry about all of that,” Finn looked down at his hands folded in his lap. Kurt was wondering if he should have started with an easier question but then Finn started to talk. “I used to tell them I didn’t want to do it. They listened when Matt and Mike said they didn’t want to be a part of it but they didn’t listen to me. When we were younger, before I got so tall, if I tried to say no they would push me around. I’d come home with mud on my clothes or sometimes they’d have holes in them and my mom would look so sad. I just didn’t want that to keep happening so I stopped saying no.”

“You didn’t think it would make her sad to know what you were doing?” Kurt could understand where Finn was coming from. After all he’d do just about anything to keep his father from being sad because of him.

“I just didn’t think about it,” Finn shrugged. “She could see the mud and the holes but she couldn’t see what happened at school. It was easier to not stand up for kids I barely knew than to disappoint my mom by coming home with dirty clothes. I disappoint her enough.”

Well that opened up a whole new set of questions Kurt wanted to ask. Wasn’t the bullied gay kid supposed to have more issues than the popular quarterback?

“So my turn?” Finn asked. “So I know why you didn’t change your clothes but why are they so important to you? I don’t think I’ve ever seen you just throw on some clothes and be lazy on the couch for the day. We lived together for like a week and me and my mom have spend the night here before and you always look so perfect.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment,” Kurt smiled, though he was sure Finn would be confused as to how it was a compliment. “It’s hard to explain. They make me feel good about myself, even if I get dumpster-tossed because of them. Some people might think I look weird but I think I look good and that’s important to me. It’s something that makes me feel different that has nothing to do with being gay.”

“How much different do you want to be?” Finn looked absolutely confused and his question confused Kurt.

“I don’t know what you mean,” he confessed.

Finn cocked his head, seeming to be trying to decide if he should explain. “Well, you sing higher than any guy I know, you can kick a football better than anyone on the team, you can rebuild a car engine without any help, and you cook stuff that I’ve only seen in those movies you and Rachel make me watch. I don’t know any person who can do all that and you don’t think you’re different enough?”

“Well when you put it that way,” Kurt had to admit hearing it in Finn’s simple way of stating things actually made him feel a little special. There wasn’t anyone else like him at the school. “It’s not just feeling different though. When I know I look good, I feel bigger so I’m not afraid to stand up for myself.”

Or pretend the bullying never bothered him, like telling the jocks they would all be working for him one day. Karofsky though, Karofsky made him feel so small that it took Blaine’s advice before he could confront him. And that had worked out so well.

“So your clothes like, give you superpowers to be brave?” Finn grinned. Kurt couldn’t help the laugh that escaped his lips. “So is that why you told off Quinn and Rachel last week when they were both being scary? Not even Santana was brave enough to do that.”

“I guess that’s one way of looking at it,” Kurt nodded thoughtfully. He had enjoyed watching both girls’ jaws drop as he ripped into them for spending most of their practice time bickering with each other. “Why is being popular so important to you? It can’t just be about not getting bullied because being in Glee is enough to get you bullied for the rest of high school.”

“It’s not really about being popular and having everybody want to be you,” Finn was back to being nervous. “That’s kind of creepy. Like someone could try to get me out of the way so they could take over my life. Creepy. I like it when people like me. If people like you then they don’t forget about you. Unless they really don‘t like you. Then they remember you too much.”

Kurt was beginning to feel their conversation was a little lopsided. His questions to Finn were making the other boy dig a lot deeper than Finn’s questions to him. Did Finn not have someone to talk to like he had Mercedes? He couldn’t imagine Puck sitting down with Finn and just listening for hours like Mercedes would do for him. Maybe later he’d ask about Finn’s friendship with Puck.

“Hungry?” he asked when he heard Finn’s stomach growl. How the boy could possibly be hungry after all he ate at the reception, Kurt just didn’t know.

“A little,” Finn replied with a slight blush colouring his cheeks. Oh how thankful Kurt was that he no longer had a crush on his now step-brother because that was cute.

“How about I make us something to eat and we’ll keep talking in the kitchen?”

“That sounds good to me.”

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: Finn and Kurt have a long needed conversation where they both try to understand the other. No bashing of either side or getting called names but an honest conversation. Finn trying to understand how Kurt can still be brave enough to be himself at school despite everything he goes through. Kurt trying to understand why Finn needs to try to please everyone and why he rarely stands up for himself.


End file.
